FONTANA >> For days, Murrieta has been a flash point in the debate over illegal immigration sparked by the arrival of Central American immigrants at a Border Patrol processing center in that city.

The attention may now be shifting to Fontana where on Thursday a group of 46 women and children arrived at St. Joseph Roman Catholic Church.

The group arrived on a Department of Homeland Security bus and consisted of mostly children and some teens accompanied by a parent or guardian, said John Andrews, spokesman for the Diocese of San Bernardino.

“This is a transition center here to provide the basics — food, water, clothing, medical care — and help them make a connection,” Andrews said.

By early Thursday afternoon, some with anti-illegal immigration sentiments had begun to make their presence known.

At one point a pickup truck drove slowly through the church parking lot and a passenger inside held up a sign that read “Send them home.”

The immigrants will be staying at a former convent at the church that has sleeping accommodations, showers and space for members of Catholic Charities of San Bernardino and Riverside Counties to collect information from the new arrivals and help them contact relatives in the country, Andrews said.

The immigrants will be at St. Joseph 24 to 48 hours before they move on, he said.

The first of the immigrants to be on their way — a women with two children — left about three and a half hours after arriving but Andrews did not know their final destination.

Most of the immigrants at St. Joseph “are going to locations in the Midwest and the East Coast,” Andrews said.

The federal government is not paying any of the expenses associated with the immigrants’ stay at St. Joseph, he said.

Petra Alexander, who works with Latino communities in the diocese, was working with the immigrant families Thursday.

The majority of the families came from El Salvador and Honduras but some from Guatemala are also part of the group.

“They all look good, they are just very tired,” Alexander said in Spanish. “They all say they came from a place that was very cold and are glad to be here.”

A team of about 50 people consisting of church volunteers and Catholic Charities personnel began working with the immigrants as soon as they arrived.

The diocese received calls from people offering to put families up in their homes but the offers were turned down because it’s not able to screen the people making the offers, Andrews said.

“We don’t want to be in a position to screen and make sure they are qualified to work with these families,” he said.

For some time, the diocese had wanted to help some of the immigrants and had been trying to determine what the best way to do that would be, Andrews said.

Last week diocese representatives met with federal authorities.

After that meeting diocese officials began looking around and saw they had some resources to work with such as St. Joseph, which not only has space but has a parish congregation that was more than willing and enthusiastic about helping out, Andrew said.

Two other parishes — St. Catherine of Siena Catholic Church in Rialto and St. Catherine of Alexandria in Riverside — are also prepared to accept immigrants if necessary, Andrews said.

At St. Catherine of Siena Catholic Church, parishioners came intermittently to the church to drop off diapers, water, food, toys and pillows, among other things. Some volunteers sat nearby, ready to lend a hand to any heavy packages or donations that came through the church doors.

Deacon Gonzalo Sotelo said community members donated cans of food and bedding.

The church is not really asking for clothing, Sotelo said. It is seeking monetary donations to purchase what’s needed, such as clothing in different sizes for the children.

Sotelo was unsure if St. Catherine of Siena would be receiving immigrants at its location.

“We’re ready to receive families here, if that happens,” Sotelo said.

Checks can be made out to the Diocese of San Bernardino with the words “humanitarian fund” in the memo line and sent to the mission office of the Diocese of San Bernardino, 1201 E. Highland Ave., San Bernardino, CA 92404.

Lending a hand to immigrants is part of living the Catholic faith, Andrews said.

Catholics are called up to reach out to the traveler and the stranger, he said, pointing to the parable of the good samaritan who aided the injured traveler he found on the side of a road.

This isn’t just a tenet of Catholicism, said Helene Slessarev-Jamir, Mildred M. Hutchinson professor of urban studies at the Claremont School of Theology.

“It’s certainly embedded within Christianity, within Judaism and within Islam,” she said, adding the parable of the Good Samaritan “is one of the most famous parables of the New Testament.”

Other groups are not as supportive of the immigrants’ arrival. Robin Hvidston, executive director of We The People Rising, said her organization is making calls to members of Congress and encouraging them to take action and secure the border.

“These children coming to our country are facing extremely dangerous and perilous situations,” Hvidston said, citing a recent statement by a congressman about the high rate of sexual assault in young girls who immigrate from Mexico. “We think it sends the wrong message to facilitate their movement. Once they’re here, they should be treated for any illness and treated completely humanely and kindly and then reunited with their families in their home countries.”

Hvidston said the churches helping the immigrants should be focusing their efforts on helping people in their native countries.

“They are enabling these countries to continue to abuse and neglect their citizens,” Hvidston said. “We’re all for helping people in their countries. To have a “Guatemalan dream” in Guatemala. This is going to enable the problem rather than changing their government and helping their people. They rely on the U.S. taxpayer and citizen to do what those governments refuse to do.”

Hvidston said she hopes Congress will send the National Guard to the border to secure it.

“These people should utilize the legal immigration system and come here legally and following our laws,” Hvidston said. “We feel like if the National Guard is deployed, that we can stop this right at the border.”

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